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Upgrading MEV-Boost

Before You Upgrade​

  1. Check the release notes for breaking changes or new requirements.
  2. Back up your configuration — especially systemd service files and YAML config files.
  3. Plan for brief downtime — your validator will fall back to local block building while MEV-Boost restarts.

Upgrade Methods​

Pre-built Binaries​

# Download the latest release
curl -L https://github.com/flashbots/mev-boost/releases/latest/download/mev-boost_linux_amd64 -o mev-boost

# Make it executable
chmod +x mev-boost

# Verify the version
./mev-boost -version

# Restart the service
sudo systemctl restart mev-boost

From Source​

cd mev-boost
git fetch origin
git checkout v1.12  # Replace with target version
make build

sudo systemctl restart mev-boost

Docker​

docker pull flashbots/mev-boost:latest
# Or pin a specific version:
docker pull flashbots/mev-boost:1.12

# Restart your container
docker restart mev-boost

Required Upgrades for Network Forks​

MEV-Boost must be updated before Ethereum network upgrades (hard forks). Running an outdated version after a fork will cause proposal failures.

Network UpgradeDateMinimum MEV-Boost Version
FusakaDec 3, 2025 (epoch 411392)v1.10
Pectra—v1.9
warning

Always upgrade MEV-Boost before a scheduled hard fork. After the fork, an outdated version will fail to produce valid blocks.

Version History and Migration Notes​

v1.11 to v1.12​

New feature: Relay Multiplexing

  • No breaking changes. Existing configurations continue to work.
  • To use relay muxing, create a YAML config file with mux groups. See Relay Multiplexing.
  • The -config and -watch-config flags are required for mux support.

v1.10 to v1.11​

New feature: Timing Games

  • No breaking changes. Existing configurations continue to work.
  • To use timing games, create a YAML config file. See Timing Games.
  • New flags: -config, -watch-config, -color.
  • Metrics latency units changed from microseconds to milliseconds. Update your Grafana dashboards and alert thresholds if you rely on latency metrics.

v1.9 to v1.10​

Required for Fusaka upgrade

  • New features: Prometheus metrics (-metrics, -metrics-addr), X-Timeout-Ms header support.
  • New flags: -metrics, -metrics-addr.
  • getPayloadV2 API support added with fallback to V1.
  • No breaking changes to existing configurations.

v1.8 to v1.9​

Required for Pectra upgrade

  • SSZ encoded message support added.
  • RISC-V platform support added.
  • Built with Go 1.24.
  • Relay monitor support removed.

Post-Upgrade Checklist​

After upgrading, verify your setup:

# 1. Check the version
./mev-boost -version

# 2. Check the service is running
sudo systemctl status mev-boost

# 3. Verify relay connectivity
curl http://localhost:18550/eth/v1/builder/status

# 4. Check logs for errors
sudo journalctl -u mev-boost -f --no-pager -n 50

# 5. If using metrics, verify they're being scraped
curl http://localhost:18551/metrics

Rollback​

If an upgrade causes issues, you can roll back to the previous version:

# If using binaries, replace with the previous version
curl -L https://github.com/flashbots/mev-boost/releases/download/v1.11/mev-boost_linux_amd64 -o mev-boost
chmod +x mev-boost
sudo systemctl restart mev-boost

# If using Docker
docker pull flashbots/mev-boost:1.11
docker restart mev-boost
tip

Keep the previous binary or Docker image tag available so you can roll back quickly if needed.